


Hic Habitat Felicitas

by ironed_orchid



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Adoption, Family, Gen, Gender Issues, Homosexuality, Recreational Drug Use, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-18
Updated: 2014-12-18
Packaged: 2018-03-02 02:00:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2795624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironed_orchid/pseuds/ironed_orchid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fragments from Felix's memory. Growing up with Sarah and Mrs. S. Figuring out his identity. Learning not to hide who he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hic Habitat Felicitas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [01189998819991197253](https://archiveofourown.org/users/01189998819991197253/gifts).



One:

Felix doesn’t remember much about before he went to live with Mrs. S. and Sarah, but he does remember a Christmas party in the group home when he was maybe four. He remembers that someone had come in a Father Christmas outfit to give all the children presents. Felix watched as the first girl to open her present pulled apart the wrapping paper, and revealed a Barbie in a bright pink dress. He had never wanted anything more in his life.

When it was his turn, Felix reached right into the sack to try to find a present that was the same narrow shape as the box the doll was in. He finally found something that felt right, and instead of opening it right there in front of everyone else, he took it to a corner to unwrap. Which was why no one saw how disappointed he was when he opened the box with a water pistol inside.

***

To be honest, as he got older, Felix found he couldn’t actually remember much about Brixton. He remembered Mrs. S.’s house, full of noise and people. He remembered her walking him and Sarah and any other children who were staying down to the corner, and across the zebra crossing and to the school gates. He remembered that on Fridays they stopped to get fish and chips on the way home.

***

Felix remembered that school as a place where he had to be quiet and keep his head down, and not do or say anything that might give him away. Anything that might show that he didn’t have a proper mum and dad, or that he was different.

***

Felix has one other clear memory: he was in his year two class and he was painting a boy with black hair whose mum was holding one hand, and whose dad was holding the other. He remembered painstakingly printing out “MY FAMILLY” under the figures. Felix remembered his teacher praising him and putting his pictures on the wall. That part he liked. He remembered her shiny lipstick and her short brown hair.

  
Two:

When Felix first came to live with Mrs. S. he had a lisp which made saying “Mrs. Sadler” difficult and “Siobhan” was almost impossible. “Just call me Mrs. S.,” she told him. “That’s what everyone else does.”

“Missiv Ev,” he repeated.

“Close enough for me, love,” said Mrs. S., and she went back to unpacking the suitcase of clothes, which he’d brought with him from the group home.

Sarah, the big girl who’d been sitting in the corner, was unconvinced. “How come you can say the esses in the middle of Missus, but you can’t say the ones at the beginnings and ends of words?” she asked.

Felix had never thought about it before. “I dunno,” he shrugged.

“Say it like this: Ess. Esssssssssss.” Felix watched, fascinated as Sarah stuck her tongue between her teeth to emphasize the hissing sound of the ess.

“Ev.” He tried. “Effs.”

“Be a snake,” said Sarah, and before Felix knew what was happening, Sarah was rolling on the floor, wriggling and hissing at him.

“Come on,” she beckoned, “are you a snake or what?” So Felix got down on the floor and for the rest of the afternoon they wriggled and hissed all over the house.

When Mrs. S. called them into the kitchen to have their tea, they got up and walked like normal children. But when no one else was looking, Sarah would stick out her tongue out or would hiss so quietly that only Felix could hear her.

Felix lost his lisp not long after that, and didn’t find it again until he was sixteen and trying to talk his way into a gay club.

  
Three:

The first thing that Sarah ever stole for Felix was a Barbie. She was nine and he was six. By then school had taught him to pretend not to be interested in dolls, so he asked what had made her think he wanted a stupid doll.

“Because you always walk slower when we go past them in the shops,” she replied.

After that he stopped trying to hide who he was from Sarah.

***

Over the next few months Felix deliberately dawdled while walking past a face painting kit, a silver tiara, and a pink feather boa. All of which mysteriously appeared in his room, but nobody ever mentioned how they got there.

By the day that Mrs. S. walked in to find him dancing to Roxette on his bed, with bright green grease on his eyelids and wearing Sarah’s purple tee-shirt as a dress, his boa and tiara were already so worn it she never thought about where they had come from.

“Ah, well,” she said. “Don’t you look grand.” Then she went to her room and came back with a silk scarf for him to wear as a belt, a string of plastic beads, and a headband.

After that Felix stopped trying to hide who he was from Mrs. S.

  
Four:

When they moved to Canada, Sarah was twelve and Felix was nearly nine.

Before they left, Sarah and Mrs. S. fought, and afterward Sarah was in a sulk for days. She wouldn’t talk to Mrs. S. unless she was asked a direct question, and even then she replied with grunts and shrugs, rather than words.

Felix tried to make both of them happy, and tried to make the bad cloud that hung over the house go away. He chattered to Mrs. S, asking endless questions about where they would live, and where he would go to school, and what he could take with him. After dinner one night, he got down the big atlas from the shelf, and he looked at the map of Canada, and read out facts about its size and its climate and how many people lived there.

Eventually, Sarah came and sat on the arm of his chair and flipped the pages back to the map that had all the countries on it.

“Canada,” she declared, “is about a million effing miles from here. It is about a million effing miles from all my friends. It is about a million effing miles from anything I like.” Then she stomped into her room and slammed the door.

“Sarah!” Mrs. S. started to shout. Then she sighed, and shrank down into herself. “It’s nearly time for _The Bill_ ,” she said. Which, Felix thought, was as blatant an attempt to change the subject as he’d ever witnessed.

***

When they got to Canada they stayed in a big house in the country while Mrs S.“got their stories straight.” Felix wanted to explore the house and gardens, but Sarah lay in bed for three days, only getting up for meals and to use the loo.

Felix got into bed with her and told her stories about how when they were old enough, they would go back to England, just the two of them, and no one could make them leave. When that didn’t work, he sat on her pillow and farted, until she pushed him off the bed with her feet.

“Pig.”

“Oink. Oink,” he replied from the floor and headbutted her knees.

When she laughed, he knew he had won.

  
Five:

Until the day he started at his new school, Felix worried about fitting in. “Fuck ‘em,” Sarah said. “If they give you any shit, I’ll sort ‘em out for you.”

“But Sarah,” he said, “You won’t be there all the time.”

“So I’ll walk you there in the morning and pick you up after class. Anyone fucks with my little brother, they’ll have me to answer to.”

As it turned out, most of the kids in Felix’s class were curious about the new kid from London, and one of the girls declared his accent to be “like, totally adorable.” There were a couple of guys who muttered “faggot” under their breath whenever he had to go past them, but he stayed out of their way, and they didn’t take it any further.

When he and Sarah walked home he told her he probably didn’t probably didn’t need a bodyguard.

“Too bad, Fi,” she replied, “You’re stuck with one for the rest of your life.”

  
Six:

When he started high school, Felix was accepted into Etobicoke School for the Arts. Mrs. S. was so proud of him that she threw a party for him and his middle school friends.

Sarah, who was now seventeen, let him sketch her when she was watching telly, in other words, when she was sitting around not moving very much anyway. By then she had discovered punk, and he drew snakes and birds emerging from her snarled and tangled hair.

He had to travel further, but it was worth it to be able to paint and be with other kids who cared about making stuff. It was also the first time that he’d been at school with other guys who were openly gay. He started stealing Sarah’s mascara, and wearing her tinted lip gloss to school.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Fi!” She said when she found him in her room, “Get your own bloody make up.”

“I thought you always wanted a sister,” he said.

“As if. It’s bad enough having you steal my shit all the time.”

But she took him to the mall and showed him how to shoplift from the makeup counter. So he knew she loved him.

  
Seven:

Felix would later say that he didn't come out, he _debuted_.

Sarah and Mrs S. supported this story, but the truth was he’d never needed to come out to them. He only ever had to be himself.

  
Eight:

At the end of that school year, Sarah moved out. Felix was distraught. “You said we would always be together.”

“We will, Fi, one day. I promise. But I can’t live with Mrs. S. and her rules anymore.”

At first Sarah slept on couches, or in the beds of various guys. But after a few months she was sharing a three-bedroom apartment in Parkdale with four other girls. She never seemed to hold a real job, and alternated between completely broke and throwing cash around like there was no tomorrow.

Felix started crashing on her couch most weekends. Sometimes they would go out to see bands, other times he would meet friends from school and try to get into the gay bars near Church and Wellesley. He discovered that he never got asked for ID when he was with Sarah, but he had a 50/50 chance when he was alone, and almost always got asked when he was with friends his own age.

One time after the bouncer waived them through with a smile he asked what the trick was.

“People know me Fi. I do things for them. I help out.” It wasn’t really an answer, but he let it go.

  
Nine:

In eleventh grade, Felix had his first real boyfriend. He still saw Sarah often, but spent more weekends with Justin. He thought he’d never been so happy.

Just before finals began, Justin broke up with him.

“I’m going to McGill,” he said. “I can’t be tied down to a boyfriend who’s still in school and in another city.”

Felix pouted and remonstrated, but nothing worked. So he flounced out and went straight over to Sarah’s place, even though it was a weeknight. He sat on the couch with Sarah and wept, while she made him a cup of tea and brought tissues. When he was all talked out, Sarah cupped his face in her hands and said, “I’ve got just the thing to make you forget all about him.”

“What?” Felix asked, finally noticing that Sarah’s eyes were glossy and bright, and her face was tight and somehow more focused than usual.

She led him to her room, took a round mirror off the wall, and sat in the center of her bed. Then she pulled a baggy of powder out of her jacket pocket, and proceeding to cut lines with her drivers license. She looked up and smiled beatifically.

“It’s coke, Fi. The real deal. And it’s going to knock your socks off.”

  
Ten:

Felix got into the fine arts programme at York, but he decided he’d rather go to OCAD than move out to the suburbs or keep commuting. Mrs. S. supported his choice, right up until he announced he was planning to move out on his own, just like his big sister had done before him.

“How’re you going to afford it,” asked Mrs. S.

“I qualify for OSAP,” said Felix.

“Well that only covers your tuition costs. What are you going to live on?”

“I’ll figure it out.” Felix said. “I’m not a baby anymore.”

Mrs. S. softened. “I still look at you and see that scared little boy you were when you came to us.”

“That’s why I need to leave! I can’t be the baby of the family forever”

***

In the end, Felix went to Sarah for help.

“How do you do it?” He asked, “how do people make money?”

“Well,” Sarah replied. “You need to figure out something you’re good at, and convince people to pay you to do it.”

“Oh!” Said Felix, smiling. “There are a couple of things people say I’m very good at.”

“Will anyone pay for them?”

“I think so. You might even say it’s the world’s oldest profession.”

Sarah blinked. “Right. Um, just be careful, alright.”

“I always am.”

Secretly, he was pleased that he had shocked her. He had been 'the good one' for far too long.

  
Eleven:

Later that year, Sarah disappeared for a few months. “Don’t worry,” she said before she left, “there’s just some things I want to try. Besides,” she gestured to her current apartment where she was living with an on again, off again boyfriend. “I just need to get away from this, sort my head out. Y’know?”

Felix assumed he would miss her terribly, but in fact he was busy with art classes, with college life, and with establishing a reputation and clientele. He did find himself doodling pictures of Sarah in his visual diary, but told himself it was just because she had been his first real model. He wasn’t missing her, not really.

***

When Sarah finally came back, she was visibly pregnant. “Come with me to see Mrs. S.” she begged, “I can’t face her on my own.” Felix acquiesced, as usual, and they went around to Mrs. S. house together.

“It’s too late,” Sarah announced, before Mrs. S. could even greet them. “I’m past the first trimester, you can’t make me get rid of it.”

“You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into.”

“I do, please trust me. I really do. I want a family. I want to be a real mum.”

“Well, love. You can always come to me. You know that.”

“I can’t believe you’re up the duff,” said Felix. “No more partying for you.”

Mrs. S. laughed, and after a minute Sarah joined in. Felix understood that it was his role, to defuse the situation with jokes and laughter. He could live with that.

***

When Kira was born, Felix and Mrs.. S. were there in the hospital, holding Sarah’s hands. “I can’t believe you are doing this to me,” Felix joked. “The last thing I want to see is my sister’s grossly stretched vagina.”

“You just stay up here by my face, and you should be able to avoid an accidental glimpse.”

Mrs. S. had no such qualms. “This won’t be the first baby I’ve seen born, and it might not be the last.”

“Don’t worry,” Sarah assured her. “I’m never doing this again.”

***

When it was over, and mother and child were cleaned up and in bed, Sarah lifted up her daughter's little hand and made a waving motion. “Look Kira, there’s your Uncle Felix. And there’s your Granny.”

“Welcome to the family, Kira.” He said. “You’re now officially stuck with me and these crazy bitches.”

“Language!” Said Mrs. S., but she was grinning. “She’s perfect, Sarah. A real gift.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Dear Recipient,  
> You requested some snapshots of Sarah and Felix's relationship growing up together and this ended up being more about Felix, and his point of view. I hope that's okay.
> 
> ***
> 
> Massive thanks to [GroteskBurlesque](http://archiveofourown.org/users/GroteskBurlesque/pseuds/GroteskBurlesque) for help with Toronto locations and art schools, and for fixing some of my persistent grammatical errors. 
> 
> I'm also indebted to people who worked out Orphan Black timelines [here](http://i.imgur.com/PCJH14C.png) [image only], [here](http://www.losttv-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=80478) [forum], and [here](http://clones-and-thrones.tumblr.com/post/87368692929/a-rough-orphan-black-timeline-as-of-2x06) [up to 2x06]. I couldn't find a date of birth for Felix, so made him 3 and a half years younger than Sarah, based roughly on the actors' age difference.
> 
> Any remaining errors are my own.


End file.
